Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\nButters has averaged 31 possessions a game during that period, but is in danger of missing next week\u2019s clash against Gold Coast in Darwin after he went past the ball to lay a fierce bump on Joel Freijah in the last quarter at Adelaide Oval.<\/p>\n
\u201cI haven\u2019t watched the replay. My initial thought was, \u2018I don\u2019t think he got him high\u2019, but I haven\u2019t had a look at it close enough,\u201d Carr said.<\/p>\n
Zak Butters could be in hot water for a bump on Joel Freijah.Source: FOX SPORTS<\/p>\n
Butters didn\u2019t have eyes on the ball when he met Freijah, who was able to play on and take his free kick, but replays were inconclusive as to whether his shoulder made contact with Freijah\u2019s chin.<\/p>\n
After a stellar start to the season, Butters had been one of the favourites for the Brownlow Medal, but betting was suspended following the incident.<\/p>\n
Port can ill afford to lose Butters, who shouldered too much of the midfield burden against the Dogs.<\/p>\n
It comes with the star free agent\u2019s future in the spotlight as he considers a move back to Victoria at season\u2019s end.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs, who Butters grew up supporting, are considered the favourites among several clubs trying to lure him home. <\/p>\n
\u201cEvery football club in the land believes if he does head home, it will be to the Dogs,\u201d Herald Sun reporter Jon Ralph said on Fox Footy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe industry view would be that if he departs as a free agent, of course the Power will match it and try force a trade.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut he\u2019s still out of contract. That means you can\u2019t ask for four first-rounders, like Essendon did with their contracted former captain, Zach Merrett.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Power have not read that memo.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bulldogs snap losing streak in close win | 02:25<\/p>\n
The Power are balancing Butters\u2019 looming free agency call with a need to match a bid on highly-rated NGA player Dougie Cochrane after the AFL changed the draft rules.<\/p>\n
It means clubs will need to pay a higher price for father-son and Academy prospects and use a maximum of two draft picks to match bids. <\/p>\n
\u201cEven without playing this year, Dougie Cochrane, their NGA player, is the consensus No. 1 draft pick. So you need two first-rounders to throw at him to match a bid in the draft,\u201d Ralph added.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou need three first-rounders overall for Zak Butters, you need to win out of this, as a net gain.\u201d<\/p>\n
Carr gave a blunt assessment of his side\u2019s efforts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were horrible, in the first half especially, trying to be too cute with the footy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe conditions obviously were slippery, but we had opportunities to get inside 50 and put them under pressure, and we didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was just a really bad night.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Power has suffered four losses of three points or less this season, but the coach is confident it hasn\u2019t dampened spirits among his group.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe keep fronting up \u2026 they\u2019re a resilient group,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cOff the back of last week\u2019s Showdown, and that disappointment, to keep fronting up and preparing the right way \u2026 we didn\u2019t start the game well, and left it up to really only a couple of players in the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cI felt like there\u2019s probably a number of passengers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miles Bergman sat out the second half of the game after suffering an injury to a big toe that will be assessed to determine its severity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Port Adelaide coach Josh Carr took a glass half-full approach after another tight loss, this time a two-point…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":658937,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[33319,638,114589,64,63,689,55,639,32114,271078,159266,318427,318428,1119,2485,47405,161648,95042,681,27709,318426,12919,677,6082,12104,701,1124,85,299814,318429,660,698,25581],"class_list":["post-658936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afl","tag-academy-prospects","tag-afl","tag-agency-call","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australia-and-new-zealand","tag-australian-football-league","tag-australianfootballleague","tag-close-call","tag-clubs-trying","tag-dougie-cochrane","tag-favourite-merges","tag-fierce-bump","tag-football-club","tag-gold-coast","tag-head-home","tag-industry-view","tag-jason-phelan","tag-jon-ralph","tag-josh-carr","tag-midfield-burden","tag-miles-bergman","tag-oceania","tag-port-adelaide","tag-port-adelaide-power","tag-queensland","tag-south-australia","tag-sports","tag-stellar-start","tag-two-point-heartbreaker","tag-victoria","tag-western-bulldogs","tag-zach-merrett"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=658936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/658936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/658937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=658936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=658936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=658936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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